Wigan 1 - Pompey 0

Wigan 1-0 Pompey

Pompey travelled to the mist to face Wigan at the JJB this afternoon, facing a team on a run of eight straight defeats. As was inevitable their run ended, ours continued as we lost 1-0.

Injures ruled out Djimi Traore and Gary O'Neil while Matty Taylor dropped to the bench in an unusual team selection. Noe Pamarot returned in place of Traore with Rudolph Douala and Richard Hughes also getting starts.

Lee McCulloch's goal midway through the second half gave Wigan a much needed win and put another dent in our European hopes.

First HalfWigan, struggling at the bottom in free fall, Pompey in the top six albeit stuttering along but the early indications were not a sign of this as Wigan created three good chances in the opening ten minutes. The first well saved by David James to deny Caleb Folan's header, Lee McCulloch then shooting wide from range before a second Folan header was claimed by James.

The first Pompey effort would come from Kanu shortly before the twenty minute mark, but his effort from the edge of the area was safely claimed by Chris Kirkland, this coming after Folan had again had an attempt saved by James. Kanu's effort however was soon followed by Rudolph Douala, making his first Premiership start, from a similar distance but with a similar result.

David Unsworth, coming up against Pompey for what is probably the first time since he was allowed to go tried his luck from within the area after a McCulloch effort had been well blocked by Sol Campbell, but this caused no problems for James.

The final chance of the half came from Pompey, again falling to Douala. After looking impressive in recent substitute appearances he earned his start he tried to mark it with his first goal but again his effort could only be directed straight at Kirkland with others better placed.

Another forty five minutes of Premiership football had passed without a goal, the fifth in a row. You couldn't help but feel at least one would be needed in the next for even a point to be gained?

Second HalfNothing was changed at half time; five minutes into the second then Harry Redknapp did alter things. Lomana LuaLua came on to replace Lauren giving the Pompey side a very attacking look to it, would this change anything though…

The answer was looking like being no. Nothing was being created with a good fifteen minutes going by before the second half's first real effort, this a 20-yard effort from Julius Aghahowa straight at James though.

Midway through the second half as confusion reigned as seemed inevitable Wigan took the lead. Confusion between Campbell and Noe Pamarot eventually saw a ball find McCulloch who shot past James and into the goal much to the delight and relief of the home fans.

If one goal was wanted at half time at least one was needed now! But could and would it come? A man who you would hope could deliver it Andrew Cole soon arrived in place of Kanu. With the final change not long in coming after. This time Matty Taylor came on for Noe Pamarot.

But for some desperate defending by Sol Campbell it could have been two with a little over fifteen minutes to play. First of all he blocked Ryan Taylor's shot then blocked the follow up from McCulloch. A second would have killed the game, as it was it was looking like one would be enough anyway… and so it was.

Match SummaryI had been confident since Boro on Tuesday we would win this match, but maybe this was more optimism than expectation as their was a certain air on inevitability about this happening.

We didn't really get going as has been the case in recent matches, something has got to change as our European hopes have taken a battering with defeat against a side we couldn't afford to lose to, a point wouldn't have been overly bad, defeat was…

I'm not giving up on the dream yet but it seems that each match recently has left me, if not all of us saying we have to win the next. Three points at Fratton against Man City next time out are no two ways about it, no must win next game - a MUST!!! Anything but victory over City and European hopes are rapidly fading.

Listening to the radio, there seems to be so many people joining the 10th will be good brigade. No it wont!!!! We made it to 6th place by sheer hard work and endeavor, and now there seems to be a distinct lack of desire from the players. Maybe time to performance relate the pay packet, instead of just letting them put on such a poor display and still pick up thier rediculous wages. Why have we let our season dip like this against opposition such as charlton, borough and wigan?? Bring on man city, and lets hope the players perform with desire!!

thanks Storage and P4Me you have restored my faith in that POMPEY FANS ARE WAKING UP !!!!! but of course some will consider us drips and tell us " it aint broke" and we shouldnt complain cos we used to be in 6th. There is a malaise about the, club and i am fed up of hearing comparisons about last season it's gone, dead and buried, and in any case this time last year we were winning . Next up it's Man City and we need to do the same as last year, win the game and kick off the year. The players need to make something of this one and Harry should stop making excuses for the players. Does anybody know the answers to my to queries a) why Harry doesnt know how to win away. b) do the players have the motivation for the fight.

Just got back and I am livid - that was a diabolical display, we were totally useless and to be honest I was completely embarrassed by our inept, incomptent performance. A very, very poor display against Charlton, no use at all in front of goal at home to Boro and today we would have done better to send up the Pompey Ladies side, we were truly crap, I defy anyone to say otherwise, it was disgusting and the players should all pay for the supporters who went up there. We are not going anywhere but to the lower half of the table, Harry and Sasha really screwed up in not signing a forward - those currently in our squad have now played over 900 hours and during that time they've scored only twice, that is attrocious! Sort it out Harry, drop Kanu, drop Cole and give Benjani and Lualua a run, at least they can run instead of those two other old crocks!!!!! With games coming up against much superior sides to recent ones, we have no chance of scoring! Yes, I'm bloody angry, I am fuming!!!

God the doom and gloom merchants are out in force. Last season we stayed up by the skin of our teeth and this season we have a very real chance of a top ten finish, transformations usually take time. the truth is we punched above our weight earlier in the season. If you ask anyone at the club they will tell you this season was intended to be one of consolidation. Nobody seriously expected a european place before the season kicked off. True we were winning this time last season, we were fighting for our lives the same way Charlton & Wigan our now.

Steve C, the problem to me is the manner in which these defeats are coming. How can you possibly defend the players attitudes against charlton, the goal shy performance against borough, and just look at what TPB has to say about the wigan game?These are the teams we have to compete against, they are our league. As Harry says the tp 4 will always be the top 4. Thats why the players have to be responsible enoughto perform against these other teams. Just remember our home run in. What i dont get is that we were 6th or above all year, then dont perform against these teams. I can take a defeat if we have really given our best, but i dont think we have lately.

Well 38pts was just enough last year. Thank goodness the bottom 3 are so far behind us otherwise there could be a real chance that we could still be relegated. A defeat to Man City next start will really put the cat amongst the pigeons and send us into freefall. Three 0s against weak opposition is not on the menu for European Football - so forget that now lads.

10th is optimistic .... were looking at just above relegation at this rate. only boro did we not conceed and that was a hard job. GJ needs to be sidelined! id say the season is over for us now tbh, a few points here and there, no cups to think about and mid table mediocrity. weve written ourselves off!

steveC maybe i'm wrong but i am hazarding a gues here that you are not seeing many games amd for get last season its gone and is no excuse for the rubbish we are paying to see. and why should we not want to win, why do we have accept criticism for wanting our team to win, i do not get this.

no we wont get relegated but isnt the right attitude to go out to win every game ...LoL there was a famous saying ..... "Try not, Do or do not there is not try only do"... by some bloke called Yoda in 3097 AD far far away in a distsnt galaxy...
now if we can only sign him on, i suppose the problem is he is only 900 years old so a bit too young to us.

Things is SteveC, it's not the fact we are losing that bothers me - it's how we are losing! And as for your comment "arry was prepared to let Cole leave on deadline day when we're not scoring goals. Thankfully he decided to stay" - well he certainly made one hell of an effort and difference against Wigan, he was like the rest were that day - bone idle and totally ineffective! So much for him staying, hardly worth it unless he gets a precision pass to him, he's too damned lazy to work for it himself.

It hasn't been good enough, effort, commitment and passion has been missing but I still cling to that hope it will change, seem to be saying this after every match but hope it does... It's not looking promising for European football like it maybe was at Christmas but we're still only a couple of wins behind Bolton (not that we can maybe see them!) and with them potentially distracted by the Cup they could well slip away, which I can see them doing... The weekend game will decide which way our season goes, if we don't win that then I'll begin to accept Europe is gone this season but will never even entertain the thought that we could still go down and won't be thinking "I'm glad that we had the start we did" as we had that start because we deserved it, no one handed it to us we earned that... I'm not going to defend the players because they get enough money, it's time they started earning it again, resting on lorals isn't good enough and most will know this and will not be happy with what's going on...

Wigan needed it more than pompy, had they have lost then the teams below them would have been able to see a glimer of hope, its not over for any of the clubs in the bottom 7 positions. They say 40 points and your safe Pompy have just got two more points to get.

Well i see almost every home game having missed no more than a dozen in the last 15 years or so. Although i can't travel to away games now i have in the past watched a huge number of away games too. My point was that transformations usually take a while, i bet there's not one of you who can seriously say that they expected Pompey to be this high in the table at this point of the season before the season started. Charlton was a poor performance but owed a lot to Charlton trying to stop us playing. As for Borough both defences were on top of their game, Borough managed what 3 efforts on goal in the whole game. In 30+ years of watching Pompey i've seen a lot worse and whilst i'm not happy with the results at the moment i really don't see that things are as bad as some people would have us believe.

Nope cant agree Steve C just because we were great in the first half of the season doesnt mean its ok to play like this now, there are not lots of new players to blend in ( in fact lauren seems more in than some who have been here a lot longer) and its not just charlton is it? We have no ther realistic option tan to sign YODA !!!

I'm not saying it's ok to play like this now. Early in the season we over performed, now teams have caught on and it's not as easy as it was. But in all honesty all any of us wanted when this season started was comfortable survival and a chance to build on that next season. Survival is just about a foregone conclusion now and next season we will be stronger still. to expect any team to jump from surviving by the skin of their teeth to european places without a pause in between is a very big ask. Having seen what european football has done to smaller teams seasons in the past i can wait a little longer for it while the team gets stronger.

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